I Am A Masterpiece

 Whether or not we have a rule that says “don’t put your hand on a hot stove”, it’s still going to hurt. 

Whether or not we have a commandment that says “don’t do this sin”, it’s still going to hurt. 

We need to stop thinking of sin as a black spot on a record in Heaven, and see it for what it really is. Sin is to the spirit as a hot pan is to the hand. The danger with sin, however, is far more nefarious and subtle. It only takes a second to register the pain of a hot stove, forcing your body pull your hand away as fast as possible. But how long does it take to register the pain in our spirit?

 

The most pure in heart among us would feel that pain rather quickly. For The rest of us, whose spiritual reflexes seem to have grown dull after repeated offenses to the spirit , it can take a long time to see the effect. Imagine how damaged your hand would be had you left it on the hot pan for 10 seconds. A minute. 20 minutes. I’ll leave it to you to determine how vividly you want to picture it. 

Every so often I will ponder on the sins that seem to creep into my life, a sort of self-inventory check. Then I try to picture my hand on red hot cast iron, and try to picture my spirit taking the same damage from these sins. This is kind of like taking a mental birth control whenever you sit next to a screaming child on an airplane. Sorry moms and dads, but you know what I mean ;)

Ok back to sin damaging the soul… you could think “so what?” What even is the soul?  I’m not hurting anyone else, and I am pretty good at sweeping the guilt away, I’m really not that affected anyways. 

To be real, those are all valid arguments. I do not doubt that you can fully believe that or feel that way. But the laws of heaven are every bit as real as the laws of physics. You throw a rock in the air, it will come down. You touch a hot pan, you will get burned. You commit a serious sin, you will get hurt, whether you can recognize it or not. 

I don’t know if I have the words to say to adequately describe how important our spirit is to us. But I will try:

Our spirit is not just something we have. It is me. It is everything about me. I am a result of everything I have experienced, everyone I have ever been close to, everything I have thought, spoken and dreamed. I am me. I am a masterpiece 31 years in the making. I am not a masterpiece of my own design, but of His. WE are His work and His glory. So let's let Him work! What a world this would be if we could all see ourselves as God sees us.